



^>>?S5(?P?WVrt??f^»?*V'tW?^.T:>;VT^;^iH'.-. 




QassJ= 
Bock 



E^%:z 



'B£2^' 



OFFICIAL DONATION. 




.■\ 



^ f 




.•^ .r^7 


^ i?) 


M ■# 








^v ,? 


-' .., 


■•"7 , 


V "-5 3 


"^ '- '/) <r 


^ 




jj 





-5 



JAMES A. GARFI1:LD. 



MEMORIAL ADDKl-SS 



HRONOL'NCBD IS THE 



HALL OF RErRESEXTATIVES, 

Febriary 27, 1SS2, 

Before the Departmests of the Government of 
THE United St a tes. 



LVMF.S C. I5LAIXE, 



IN RtSPONSK TO AN INVITATION KROM THE 
TWO HOUSES OK CONGRESS. 



WASHINGTON": 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING O I" F I C F. 
1882. 



MEMORIAL ADDRESS, 



Mr. President : For the second time in 
this generation the great departments of 
the Government of the United States are 
assembled in the Hall of Representatives 
to do honor to the memory of a murdered 
President. Lincoln fell at the close of 
a mighty struggle in which the passions 
of men had been deeply stirred. The 
tragical termination of his great life added 
but another to the lengthened succession 
of horrors which had marked so many 
lintels with the blood of the first-born. 
Gari-iki-I) was slain in a day of peace, 
when brother had been reconciled to 
brother, and when anger and hate had 
been banished from the land. "Whoever 
shall hereafter draw the portrait of murder, 
if he will show it as it has been exhibited 



4 
where such example was last to have been 
looked for, let him not give it the grim 
visage of Moloch, the brow knitted by 
revenge, the face black with settled hate. 
Let him draw, rather, a decorous, smooth- 
faced, bloodless demon; not so much an 
example of human nature in its depravity 
and in its paroxysms of crime, as an 
infernal being, a fiend in the ordinary 
display and development of his character. " 



From the landing of the Pilgrims at Ply- 
mouth till the uprising against Charles I., 
about twenty thousand emigrants came 
from old England to New England. As 
they came in pursuit of intelledtual freedom 
and ecclesiastical independence rather than 
for worldly honor and profit, the emigra- 
tion naturally ceased when the contest for 
religious liberty began in earnest at home. 
The man who struck his most efiective 



blow for freedom of conscience by sailing 
for the colonies in 1620 would have been 
accounted a deserter to leave after 1640. 
The opportunity had then come on the soil 
of England for that great contest which 
established the authority of Parliament, 
gave religious freedom to the people, sent 
Charles to the block, and committed to the 
hands of Oliver Cromwell the supreme 
executive authority of England. The 
English emigration was never renewed, 
and from these twenty thousand men, 
and from a small emigration from Scot- 
land, from Ireland, and from Erance, are 
descended the \ast numbers who have 
New England blood in their veins. 

In 1685 the revocation of the edid of 
Nantes by Louis XIV. scattered to other 
countries four hundred thousand Protest- 
ants, who were among the most intelligent 
and enterprising of Erench subjects — 
merchants of capital, skilled manufact- 



urers, and handicraftsmen, superior at the 
time to all others in Europe. A consider- 
able number of these Huguenot French 
came to America; a few landed in New 
England and became honorably prominent 
in its history. Their names have in large 
part become anglicized, or have disap- 
peared, but their blood is traceable in 
many of the most reputable families, and 
their fame is perpetuated in honorable 
memorials and useful institutions. 

From these two sources, the FLnglish- 
Puritan and the French-Huguenot, came 
the late President — his father, Abram Gar- 
field, being descended from the one, and 
his mother, Eliza Ballou, from the other. 

It was good stock on both sides — none 
better, none braver, none truer. There 
was in it an inheritance of courage, of man- 
liness, of imperishable love of liberty, of 
undying adherence to principle. ( jARFIeld 
was proud of his blood; and, with as much 



7 
satisfaction as if he were a British noble- 
man reading his stately ancestral record in 
Burke's Peerage, he spoke of himself as 
ninth in descent from those who would 
not endure the oppression of the Stuarts, 
and seventh in descent from the brave 
French Protestants who refused to submit 
to tyranny even from the Grand Monarque. 
General Garfield delighted to dwell on 
these traits, and, during his only visit to En- 
gland, he busied himself in searching out 
every trace of his forefathers in parish reg- 
istries and on ancient army rolls. Sitting 
with a frientl in the gallery of the House 
of Commons, one night, after a long day's 
labor in this field of research, he said, with 
evident elation, that in every war in which 
for three centuries patriots of English blood 
had struck sturdy blows for constitutional 
government and human liberty, his family 
had been represented. They were at Mars- 
ton Moor, at Naseby, and at Preston; they 



8 

were at Bunker Hill, at Saratoga, and at 
Monmouth; and in his own person had 
battled for the same great cause in the 
war which preserved the Union of the 
States. 

His father dying before he was two 
years old, Garfield's early life was one 
of privation, but its poverty has been 
made indelicately and unjustly prominent. 
Thousands of readers have ima<>ined him 
as the ragged, starving child, whose reality 
too often greets the eye in the squalid 
sections of our large cities. General Gar- 
fU'Ld's infancy and youth had none of 
this destitution, none of these pitiful feat- 
ures appealing to the tender heart, and to 
the open hand, of charity. He was a poor 
boy in the same sense in which Henry 
Clay was a poor boy; in which Andrew 
Jackson was a poor boy; in which Daniel 
Webster was a poor boy; in the sense in 
which a large majority of the eminent men 



9 

of America in all generations have been 
poor boys. Before a great multitude, in 
a ])ublic speech, Mr. Webster bore this 
testimony: 

" It (lid not ha|)pen to me to be born in a 
log cabin, but my elder brothers and sisters 
were born in a log cabin raised amid the 
snow-drifts of New Hampshire, at a period 
so early that when the smoke rose first from 
its rude chimney and curled oxer the frozen 
hills there was no similar evidence of a 
white man's habitation between it and the 
settlements on the ri\ers of Canada. Its 
remains still exist. I make to it an annual 
visit. I carry my children to it to teach 
them the hardships endured b)- the genera- 
tions which have gone before them. I love 
to dwell on the tender recollections, the 
kintlred ties, the earl) affections, and the 
touching narratives and incidents which 
mingle with all I know of this primitive 
family abode." 



lO 



With the requisite change of scene the 
same words would aptly portray the early 
days of Garfield. The poverty of the 
•frontier, where all are engaged in a com- 
mon struggle and where a common sym- 
pathy and hearty co-operation lighten the 
burdens of each, is a very different pov- 
erty, different in kind, different in influ- 
ence and effect, from that conscious and 
humiliating indigence which is every day 
forced to contrast itself with neighboring 
wealth on which it feels a sense of grinding 
dependence. The poverty of the frontier is 
indeed no poverty. It is but the beginning 
of wealth, and has the boundless possibili- 
ties of the future always opening before it. 
No man ever grew up in the agricultural 
regions of the West, where a house-raising, 
or even a corn-husking, is matter of com- 
mon interest and helpfulness, with any 
other feeling than that of broad-minded, 
generous independence. This honorable 



1 1 



independence marked the \oiith of Car- 
i-iHLi), as it marks the youth of inilHons of 
the best blood and brain now training^ for 
the future citizenship and future govern- 
ment of the Republic. CiARi-ii:Li) was 
born heir to land, to the title of freeholder, 
which has been the jxitent and passport of 
self-respect with the Anglo-Saxon race 
ever since Ilengist and llorsa landed on 
the shores of I-Jigland. 11 i^ adventure on 
the canal — an alternative between that and 
the deck of a Lake Erie schooner — was a 
farmer boy's device for earning money, just 
as the New Hngland lad begins a possibly 
great career by sailing before the mast on 
a coasting vessel, or on a merchantman 
bound to the farther India or to the China 
seas. 

No iiKfnly man feels anything of shame 
in looking back to early struggles with 
adverse circumstances, and no man feels a 
worthier pride than when he has conquered 



12 



the obstacles to his progress. But no one 
of noble mould desires to be looked upon 
'as having occupied a menial position, as 
having been repressed by a feeling of infe- 
riority, or as having suffered the evils of 
poverty until relief was found at the hand 
of charity. General Garfield's youth 
presented no hardships which family love 
and family energy did not overcome, sub- 
jected him to no privations which he did 
not cheerfully accept, and left no memories 
save those which were recalled with delight, 
and transmitted with profit and with pride. 
Garfield's early opportunities for secur- 
ing an education were extremely limited, 
and yet were sufficient to develop in him 
an intense desire to learn. He could read 
at three years of age, and each winter he 
had the advantage of the distrid school. 
He read all the books to be found within 
the circle of his acquaintance; some of 
them he got by heart. While yet in child- 



13 
hood he was a constant student of the 
I)il)lc. anil became familiar with its Htera- 
tiire. i'he dii^nity and earnestness of his 
speech in his maturer life ;<ave evidence 
of this early trainini;. At eij^diteen years 
of ai,^e he was able to teach school, and 
thenceforward his ambition was to obtain 
a colle^^e education. To this end he bent 
all his efforts, workinjj^ in the harvest field, 
at the carpenter's bench, and, in the winter 
season, teachin^^ the common schools of 
the neii(hborhood. While thus laboriously 
occupietl he found time to prosecute his 
studies, and was so successful that at 
twenty-two )ears of age he was able to 
enter the junior class at Williams CoUes/e, 
then under the presidency of the venerable 
and honored Mark Hopkins, who. in the 
fullness of his |)owers, survives the emi- 
nent |)U|)il to whom he was of inestimable 
service. 

The histor\- of r,.\Riii-i.i)'s life to this 



14 

pcricxl presents no novel features. He 
had undoubtedly shown perseveranee, self- 
reliance, self-sacrifice, and ambition — qual- 
ities which, be it said for the honor of our 
country, are everywhere to be found among 
the young men of America. But from his 
graduation at Williams onward, to the hour 
of his tragical death, Gakfiklu's career was 
eminent and exceptional. Slowly working 
through his educational period, receiving 
his diploma when twenty-four years of age, 
he seemed at one bound to spring into 
conspicuous and brilliant success. Within 
six years he was successively President of 
a College, vState Senator of Ohio, Major 
General of the Army of the United States, 
and Representative eleCl to the National 
Congress. A combination of honors so 
varied, so elevated, within a period so 
brief and to a man so young, is without 
precedent or parallel in the history of the 
country. 



15 

(/ \Ki iiii.d's army life was begun with no 
other niihtar)- knowledge than such as he 
had hastily gained from books in the few 
months preceding his march to the field. 
Stepping from ci\il life to the head of a 
regiment, the first order he received when 
ready to cross the Ohio was to assume 
command of a brigade, and to operate as 
an independent force in Kastern Kentucky. 
His immetliate duty was to check the 
advance of Humphrey Marshall, who was 
marching down the Big Sandy with the 
intention of occupying, in connection with 
other Confederate forces, the entire territory 
of Kentuck)', and of precipitating the State 
into secession. This was at the close of 
the year 1861. Seldom, if e\er, has a 
young college professor been thrown into 
a more embarrassing and discouraging 
position. lie knew just enough of mili- 
tary- science, as he expressed it himself, to 
measure the extent of his ignorance, and 



i6 

with a handful of men he was marching, 
in rough winter weather, into a strange 
country, among a hostile population, to 
confront a largely superior force under the 
command of a distinguished graduate of 
West Point, who had seen adive and 
important service in two preceding wars. 
The result of the campaign is matter 
of history. The skill, the endurance, the 
extraordinary energy shown byGyVRFiELD, 
the courage he imparted to his men, raw 
and untried as himself, the measures he 
adopted to increase his force and to create 
in the enemy's mind exaggerated estimates 
of his numbers, bore perfect fruit in the 
routing of Marshall, the capture of his 
camp, the dispersion of his force, and the 
emancipation of an important territory 
from the control of the rebellion. Coming 
at the close of a long series of disasters to 
the Union arms, Garfield's vidory had an 
unusual and extraneous importance, and in 



17 
the popular jiul;^micnt elevated the young 
commander to the rank of a miiitar\- hero. 
With less than two thousand men in his 
entire command, with a mobilized force of 
only eleven hundred, with(nit cannon, he 
had met an army of fi\e thousand and 
defeated them — driving Marshall's forces 
successively from two strongholds of their 
own selection, fortified with abundant artil- 
lery'. Major (jeneral Huell, commanding 
the Department of the Ohio, an expe- 
rienced and able soldier ol the Regular 
Army, published an order of thanks and 
congratulation on the brilliant result of the 
Hig Sandy Campaign, which would have 
turned the head of a less cool and sensi- 
ble man than Garfimld. Buell declared 
that his services had called into action the 
highest (jualities of a soldier, and Presi- 
dent Lincoln supplemented these words 
of praise by the more substantial reward 
of a Hrii/adier General's Commission, to 



i8 

bear date from the day of his decisive 
victory over Marshall. 

The subsequent military career of (>ar- 
FiKLD fully sustained its brilliant beginning. 
With his new commission he was assigned 
to the command of a brigade in the Army 
of the Ohio, and took part in the second 
and decisive day's fight on the bloody field 
of .Shiloh. The remainder of the year 1862 
was not especially eventful to Garfield, as 
it was not to the armies with which he was 
serving. His practical sense was called into 
exercise in completing the task, assigned 
him by General Buell, of reconstructing 
bridges and re-establishing lines of railway 
communication for the Army. His occu- 
pation in this useful but not brilliant field 
was varied by service on courts-martial of 
importance, in which department of duty 
he won a valuable reputation, attracting 
the notice and securing the appro\al of the 
able and eminent Judge Advocate General 



'9 

of the Army. This of itself was warrant 
to honorable fame; for among the great 
men who in those trying clays gave them- 
selves, w ith entire devotion, to the service 
of their country, one who brought to that 
service the ripest learning, the most fer\id 
elocjuence, the most varied attainments, 
who labored with modesty and shunned 
applause, who in the day of triumph 
sat reserved antl silent and grateful — as 
Francis Deak in the hour of Hungary's 
deliverance — was Joseph Molt, of Ken- 
tucky, who in his honorable retirement 
enjoys the respect and veneration of all 
who lo\e the I'nion of the States. 

Iiarl\- in 1863 ("iAKI ii:i.i) was assigned 
to the highl)- important and responsible 
post of Chief of Staff to General Rosecrans, 
then at the head of the Army of the 
Cumberland. Perhaps in a great military 
canijjaign no subordinate officer recjuires 
sounder judgment ant! (juicker knowledge 



20 

of men than the Chief of Staff to the Com- 
manding General. An indiscreet man in 
such a position can sow more discord, 
breed more jealousy, and disseminate more 
strife than any other officer in the entire 
organization. When General Garfield 
assumed his new duties he found various 
troubles already well developed and seri- 
ously affeding the value and efficiency of 
the Army of the Cumberland. The energy, 
the impartiality, and the tatt with which he 
sought to allay these dissensions, and to 
discharge the duties of his new "and trying 
position, will always remain one of the most 
striking proofs of his great versatility. His 
military duties closed on the memorable 
field of Chickamauga, a field which, how- 
ever disastrous to the Union arms, gave 
to him the occasion of winning imperish- 
able laurels. The very rare distinction 
was accorded him of a great promo- 
tion for bravery on a field that was lost. 



21 



President Lincoln appointed him a Major 
General in the Army of the L'nited States 
for gallant and meritorious conduct in the 
battle of Chickamauga. 

The Army of the Cumberland was reor- 
ganized under the command of General 
Thomas, who promptly offered Gakfieli) 
one of its divisions. lie was extremely 
desirous to accept the position, but was 
embarrassed by the fact that he had, a )ear 
before, been elected to Congress, and the 
time when he must take his seat was draw- 
ing near. He preferred to remain in the 
military service, and had within his own 
breast the largest confidence of success in 
the wider field which his new rank opened 
to him. Balancing the arguments on the 
one side and the other, anxious to deter- 
mine what was for the best, desirous above 
all things to do his patriotic dut) , hc was 
decisively influenced by the advice of Pres- 
ident Lincoln and Secretary Stanton, both 



22 

of whom assured him that he could, at that 
time, be of especial value in the House of 
Representatives. He resigned his com- 
mission of major-general on the 5th day 
of December, 1863, and took his seat in 
the House of Representatives on the 7th. 
He had served two years and four months 
in the Army, and had just completed his 
thirty-second year. 

The Thirty-eighth Congress is pre-emi- 
nently entitled in history to the designation 
of the War Congress. It was ele(il:ed while 
the war was flagrant, and every member 
was chosen upon the issues involved in the 
continuance of the struggle. The Thirty- 
seventh Congress had, indeed, legislated 
to a large extent on war measures, but it 
was chosen before any one believed that 
secession of the States would be actually 
attempted. The magnitude of the work 
which fell upon its successor was unpre- 
cedented, both in respec^t to the vast sums 



23 

of money raised for the support of the 
Army and Na\y, and of the new and 
extraordinary powers of legislation which 
it was forced to exercise. Only twenty- 
four States were represented, and one 
hundred and eighty-two members were 
upon its roll. Among these were many 
distinguished party leaders on both sides, 
veterans in the public service, with estab- 
lished reputations for ability, and with 
that skill which comes onl\- from parlia- 
mentar>- experience. Into this assemblage 
of men Garfield entered without special 
preparation, and, it might almost be said, 
unexpectedK. The question of taking 
command of a dixision of troops under 
General Thomas, or taking his seat in Con- 
gress, was kept open till the last moment, 
so late, indeed, that the resignation of his 
militar)' commission and his appearance in 
the House were almost contemporaneous. 
He wore the uniform of a major-general of 



24 

the United States Army on Saturday, and 
on Monday, in civilian's dress, he answered 
to the roll-call as a Representative in Con- 
gress from the State of Ohio. 

He was especially fortunate in the con- 
stituency which elected him. Descended 
almost entirely from New England stock, 
the men of the Ashtabula distrid were 
intensely radical on all ciuestions relating 
to human rights. Well educated, thrifty, 
thoroughly intelligent in affairs, acutely 
discerning of character, notc[uick to bestow 
confidence, and slow to withdraw it, they 
were at once the most helpful and most 
cxading of supporters. Their tenacious 
trust in men in whom they have once con- 
fided is illustrated by the unparalleled fad 
that Elisha Whittlesey, Joshua R. Giddings, 
and James A. Garfield represented the 
district for fifty-four years. 

There is no test of a man's ability in any 
department of public life more severe than 



25 

service in the House of Representatives; 
there is no place where so httle deference 
is paid to reputation previously acquired, 
or to eminence won outside ; no place where 
so little consideration is shown for the feel- 
ings or the failures of beginners. What a 
man gains in the Mouse he gains by sheer 
force of his own character, and if he loses 
and falls back he must expect no mercy, 
and will recei\"e no sympath)-. It is a field 
in which the survival of the strongest is 
the recognized rule, and where no pretense 
can deceive and no glamour can mislead. 
The real man is discovered, his worth is 
impartially weighed, his rank is irreversibly 
decreed. 

With possibly a single exception, Gar- 
riELD was the youngest member in the 
House when he entered, and was but seven 
years from his college graduation. But he 
had not been in his seat sixty days before 
his ability was recognized and his place 



26 

conceded. He stepped to the front with 
the confidence of one who belonged there. 
The House was crowded with strong men 
of both parties; nineteen of them have 
since been transferred to the Senate, and 
manv of them have served with distinction 
in the gubernatorial chairs of their resped- 
ive States, and on foreign missions of great 
consequence; but among them all none 
grew so rapidly, none so firmly, as (iAR- 
FiELD. As. is said by Trevelyan of his 
parliamentary hero, Gari'IKLD succeeded 
"because all the world in concert could 
not have kept him in the background, and 
because when once in the front he played 
his part with a prompt intrepidity and a 
commanding ease that were but the out- 
ward symptoms of the immense reserves 
of energy on which it w^as in his power to 
draw." Indeed, the apparently reserved 
force which GAUFiiiLD possessed was one 
of his great charaderistics. He never did 



27 



so well but that it seemed he could easily 
have done better. He never expended so 
much stren^rth but that he appeared to be 
holding additional power at call. This is 
one of the happiest and rarest distin(itions 
of an effectixe debater, and often counts 
for as much, in persuading an assembly, as 
the eloquent and elaborate argument. 

The great measure of C.aki ii:i.i)s fame 
was tilled by his service in the House of 
Representatives. His military life, illus- 
trated by honorable performance, and rich 
in promise, was, as he himself felt, prema- 
turely terminated, and necessarily incom- 
plete. Speculation as to what he might 
have done in a field where the great prizes 
are so few, cannot be profitable. It is 
sufficient to say that as a soldier he did 
his duty bravely; he did it intelligently; 
he won an en\iable fame, and he retired 
from the service \\'ithout blot or breath 
again.st him. As a lawyer, though admi- 



28 

rably equipped for the profession, he can 
scarcely be said to have entered on its 
practice. The few efforts he made at the 
bar ^vere distinguished by the same high 
order of talent which he exhibited on every 
field where he ^vas put to the test; and, if a 
man may be accepted as a competent judge 
of his own capacities and adaptations, the 
law was the profession to which Garfield 
should have devoted himself But fate 
ordained otherwise, and his reputation in 
history will rest largely upon his ser\'ice in 
the I louse of Representatives. That serv- 
ice was exceptionally long. He was nine 
times consecutively chosen to the House, 
an honor enjoyed probably by not twenty 
other Representatives of the more than 
five thousand who have been elerted from 
the organization of the Government to this 
hour. 

As a parliamentary orator, as a debater 
on an issue squarely joined, where the 



29 

position had been chosen and the ground 
laid out, Garfikli) must be assigned a 
very high rani<. More. |)erhaps, than any 
man with whom he was associated in 
pubhc hfe, he gave careful and systematic 
study to public questions, and he came to 
e\ery (.liscussion in which he took part w ith 
elaborate and complete preparation. lie 
was a steady and indefatigable worker. 
Those who imagine that talent or genius 
can supply the place or achieve the results 
of labor will find no encouragement in 
Gari-iilld's life. In preliminary work he 
was apt, rapid, and skillful. I le possessed 
in a high degree the i)Owcr of readily 
absorbing ideas and facts, and, like Dr. 
Johnson, had the art of getting from a 
book all that was of \alue in it by a 
reading apparently so cjuick and cursory 
that it seemed like a mere glance at the 
table of contents. He was a pre-emi- 
nently fair and candid man in debate. 



30 

took no petty advantage, stooped to no 
unworthy methods, avoided personal allu- 
sions, rarely appealed to prejudice, did not 
seek to intianie passion. He had a quicker 
eye for the strong point of his adversary 
than for his weak point, and on his own 
side he so marshalled his weighty argu- 
ments as to make his hearers forget any 
possible lack in the complete strength of 
his position. He had a habit of stating 
his opponent's side with such amplitude of 
fairness and such liberality of concession 
that his followers often complained that he 
was giving his case away. But never in 
his prolonged participation in the proceed- 
ings of the House did he give his case 
away, or fail in the judgment of competent 
and impartial listeners to gain the mastery. 
These characteristics, which marked 
Garfield as a great debater, did not, 
howe\er, make him a great parliamentary 
leader. .\ parliamentary leader, as that 



3' 



term is understood wherever free repre- 
sentative government exists, is necessarily 
and \-ery strictly the organ of his party. 
An ardent American defined the instinctive 
warmth of j^atriotism when he offered the 
toast, '"Our country, always right; but right 
or wrong, our countr)-."' The parliamentary 
leader who has a body of followers that will 
tlo and dare and die for the cause, is one 
who believes his party always right, but 
right or wrong, is for his party. No more 
important or exacting duty devolves u])on 
him than the selection of the field and 
the time for contest. He must know not 
mercl) how to strike, but where to strike 
and when to strike. He often skillfully 
avoids the strength of his opponent's ]K>si- 
tion and scatters confusion in his ranks by 
attacking an exposed point when really the 
righteousness of the cause and the strength 
of logical intrenchment are asj^ainst him. 
He concjuers often both against the right 



32 



and the heavy battahons; as when youni^ 
Charles Fox, in the days of his Toryism, 
carried the House of Commons aj^ainst jus- 
tice, against its immemorial rights, against 
his own convictions, if, indeed, at that period 
Fox had conxictions, and, in the interest of 
a corrupt administration, in obedience to a 
tyrannical sovereign, drove Wilkes from 
the seat to which the eledlors of Middlesex 
had chosen him, and installed Luttrell, in 
defiance not merely of law but of public 
decency. For an achievement of that kind 
(lARi'iKLi) was disc[ualified — disqualified 
l)y the texture of his mind, by the honesty 
of his heart, by his conscience, and by every 
instinct and aspiration of his nature. 

•The three most distinguished parlia- 
mentary leaders hitherto developed in this 
country are Mr. Clay, Mr. Douglas, and 
Mr. Thaddeus Stevens. They were all men 
of consummate ability, of great earnestness, 
of intense personality, difiering widely each 



'>'> 

oo 



from the others, and yet with a signal trait 
in common — the power to command. In 
the give-and-take of daily discussion, in the 
art of controlling and consolidating reluct- 
ant and refradory followers, in the skill to 
overcome all forms of opposition, and to 
meet with competency and courage the 
varying phases of unlooked-for assault or 
unsuspected defection, it would be difficult 
to rank witli these a fourth name in all our 
Congressional history. But of these Mr. 
Clay was the greatest. It would, perhaps, 
he impossible to find in the parliamentary 
annals of the world a parallel to Mr. Clay, 
in 1841, when at sixty-four years of age he 
took the control of the ^\'hig party from the 
President who had received their suffrages, 
against the power of Webster in the Cabi- 
net, against the eloquence of Choate in the 
Senate, against the herculean efforts of 
Caleb Cushing and Henry A. Wise in the 
House. In unshared leadership, in the 



-3 



34 
pride and plenitude of power, he hurled 
against John Tyler with deepest scorn the 
mass of that conquering column which had 
swept over the land in 1840, and drove his 
administration to seek shelter behind the 
lines of its political foes. Mr. Douglas 
achieved a victory scarcely less wonderful 
when, in 1854, against the secret desires of 
a strong administration, against the wise 
counsel of the older chiefs, against the 
conservative instincts and even the moral 
sense of the country, he forced a reludant 
Congress into a repeal of the Missouri 
Compromise. Mr. Thaddeus Stevens in 
his contests from 1865 to 1868 actually 
advanced his parliamentary leadership until 
Congress tied the hands of the President 
and governed the country by its own 
will, leaving only perfunctory duties to be 
discharged by the Executive. With two 
hundred millions of patronage in his hands 
at the opening of the contest, aided l)y the 



35 



a::tive force of Seward in the Cabinet and 
the moral j^owcr of Chase on the bench, 
Andrew Johnson could not command the 
sujjport of one-third in either House 
ajrainst the parliamentary uprising of which 
Thaddeus Stevens was the animating spirit 
and the unquestioned leader. 

From these three great men Garfield 
differed radically, differed in the ciualit)' of 
his mind, in temperament, in the form and 
phase of ambition, lie could not do what 
they did, but he could do what they could 
not. and in the breadth of his Concessional 
work he left that which will longer exert a 
jjotential influence among men, and which, 
measured by the severe test of posthumous 
criticism, will secure a more enduring and 
more enviable fame. 

Those unfamiliar with CiAKi-iiiLD's in- 
dustry, and ignorant of the details of his 
work, may, in some degree, measure them 
b)- the annals of Congress. No one of the 



36 

generation of public men to which he 
beloncred has contributed so much that 
will prove valuable for future reference. 
His sj)eeches are numerous, many of them 
brilliant, all of them well studied, carefully 
phrased, and exhaustix e of the subject 
under consideration. Colleded from the 
scattered pages of ninety royal octavo vol- 
umes of Congressional record, they would 
present an invaluable compendium of the 
political events of the most important era 
through which the National Government 
has ever passed. When the history of this 
|)erit)d shall be impartially written, when 
war legislation, measures of reconstruction, 
protection of hunian rights, amendments 
to the Constitution, maintenance of public 
credit, steps toward specie resumption, true 
theories of revenue, may be reviewed, un- 
surroundetl b)' i)rcjudice and disconnedled 
from partisanism, the speeches of Gari'IIiLD 
will be estimated at their true value, and 



37 
will be found to comprise a vast magazine 
of fa(5t and argument, of clear anal \ sis and 
sound conclusion. Indeed, if no other 
authority were accessible, his speeches in 
the House of Representatives from Decem- 
ber, 1863, to June, 1880, would give a well- 
connected history and complete defense of 
the important legislation of the seventeen 
eventful years that constitute his parlia- 
mentary life. F^r beyond that, his speeches 
would be found to forecast many great 
measures yet to be completed — measures 
which he knew were beyond the public 
opinion of the hour, but which he confi- 
dently beliexed would secure popular ap- 
proval w ithin the period of his own lifetime 
and by the aid of his own efforts. 

Differing, as Garfield does, from the 
brilliant parliamentary leaders, it is not 
easy to find his counterpart anywhere in 
the record of American public life. He, 
perhaps, more nearly resembles Mr. Sew- 



38 
anl in his supreme faith in the all-con- 
quering power of a principle. He had the 
love of learning, and the patient industry 
of investigation, to which John Quincy 
Adams owes his prominence and his Pres- 
idency. He had some of those ponderous 
elements of mind which distinguished Mr. 
Webster, and which, indeed, in all our pub- 
lic life have left the great Massachusetts 
Senator without an intellectual peer. 

In English parliamentary history, as in 
our own, the leaders in the House of 
Commons present points of essential dif- 
ference from Gakfif.ld. But some of his 
methods, recall the best features in the 
strong, independent course of Sir Robert 
Peel, to whom he had striking resem- 
blances in the type of his mind and in 
the habit of his speech. He had all of 
Burke's love for the Sublime and the 
Beautiful, with, possibly, something of his 
superabundance. In his faith and his 



39 

maj^nanimity, in liis jxnvcr of statement, 
in his subtle analysis, in his faultless logic, 
in his love of literature, in his wealth and 
world of illustration, one is reminded of 
that great English statesman of to-day, 
who, confronted with obstacles that would 
daunt any but the dauntless, reviled by 
those whom he uou,ld relieve as bitterly 
as by those whose supposed rights he is 
forced to in\"ade, still labors with serene 
courage for the amelioration of Ireland 
and for the honor of the English name. 

GARi-iiiLDS nomination to the Presi- 
dency, while not predicted or anticipated, 
was not a surprise to the country. His 
prominence in Congress, his solid quali- 
ties, his wide reputation, strengthened by 
his then recent election as Senator from 
Ohio, kept him in the public eye as a man 
occupying the very highest rank among 
those entitled to be called statesmen. It 
was not mere chance that brought him this 



40 

hii^h honor. "We must," says Mr. Emer- 
son, "reckon success a constitutional trait. 
If Eric is in robust health and has slept 
well and is at the top of his condition, 
and thirty years old at his departure frt)m 
Greenland, he will steer west and his ships 
\vill reach Newfoundland. But take Eric 
out and put in a stronger and bolder man, 
and the ships will sail six hundred, one 
thousand, fifteen hundred miles farther 
and reach Labrador and New England. 
There is no chance in results." 

As a candidate, Garfield steadily grew 
in popular favor. He was met with a 
storm of detradion at the very hour of his 
nomination, and it continued w ith increas- 
ing volume and momentum until the close 
of his vidorious campaign: 

No might nor greatness in mortality 
Can censure 'scape; backwounding calumny 
The whitest virtue strikes. What king so strong 
Can tie the gall up in the slanderous tongue? 



41 

Under it all he was calm, and strong, 
and confident; never lost his self-posses- 
sion, did no unwise act, spoke no hasty or 
ill-considered word. Indeed, nothing in 
his whole life is more remarkable or more 
creditable than his bearing through those 
fi\e full months of vituperation — a pro- 
longed agony of trial to a sensitixe man, a 
constant and cruel draft upon the powers 
of moral endurance. The great mass of 
these unjust imputations passed unnoticed, 
and with the general ddbris of the cam- 
paign fell into oblivion. But in a few 
instances the iron entered his soul, and 
he died with the injury unforgotten if not 
unforgiven. 

One aspecT; of Gari-ield's candidacy was 
unprecedented. Never before, in the his- 
tory of partisan contests in this country, 
had a successful Presidential candidate 
spoken freely on passing events and cur- 
rent issues. To attempt anything of the 



42 

kind seemed novel, rash, and even des- 
perate. The older class of voters recalled 
the unfortunate Alabama letter, in which 
Mr. Clay was supposed to have signed his 
political death-warrant. They remembered 
also the hot-tempered effusion by which 
General Scott lost a large share of his pop- 
ularity before his nomination, and the un- 
fortunate speeches which rapidly consumed 
the remainder. The younger voters had 
seen Mr. Greeley, in a series of vigorous 
and original addresses, preparing the path- 
way for his own defeat. Unmindful of 
these warnings, unheeding the advice of 
friends, Garfield spoke to large crow^ds 
as he journeyed to and from New York in 
August, to a great multitude in that city, 
to delegations and deputations of every 
kind that called at Mentor during the 
summer and autumn. With innumerable 
critics, watchful and eager to catch a phrase 
that might be turned into odium or ridicule, 



43 
or a sentence that mi<<ht be distorted to his 
own or his party's injury, Garfield ditl 
not trip or halt in any one of his se\cnty 
speeches. This seems all the more remark- 
able when it is remembered that he did not 
write what he said, and yet spoke with such 
logical consecutiveness of thought and such 
admirable precision of phrase as to defy the 
accident of misreport and the malignity of 
misrepresentation. 

In the beginning of his Presidential life 
Gakmhlu's experience did not yield him 
pleasure or satisfaction. The duties that 
engross so large a portion of the Presi- 
dent's time were distasteful to him, and 
were unfavorably contrasted w ith his legis- 
lative work. " I have been dealing all 
these years with ideas," he impatiently 
exclaimed one day, "and here I am deal- 
ing only with persons. I have been hereto- 
fore treating of the fundamental principles 
of government, and here I am considering 



44 

all day whether A or B shall be appointed 
to this or that office." He was earnestly 
seeking some pradical way of corredling 
the evils arising from the distribution of 
overgrowai and unwieldy patronage — evils 
always appreciated and often discussed by 
him, but whose magnitude had been more 
deeply impressed upon his mind since his 
accession to the Presidency. Had he lived, 
a comprehensive improvement in the mode 
of appointment and in the tenure of office 
would have been proposed by him, and, 
with the aid of Congress, no doubt per- 
feded. 

But, w^hile many of the Executive duties 
were not grateful to him, he was assiduous 
and conscientious in their discharge. From 
the very outset he exhibited administrative 
talent of a high order. He grasped the 
helm of office with the hand of a master. 
In this resped, indeed, he constantly sur- 
prised many who were most intimately 



45 
associated with him in the Government, 
antl especially those who had feared that 
he mij;ht be lacking in the executive fac- 
ultv. His disposition t)f business was 
orderly and rapid. His power of analysis, 
and his skill in classification, enabled him 
to dispatch a vast mass of detail with sin- 
gular promptness and ease. His Cabinet 
meetings were admirably conducted. His 
clear presentation of official subjects, his 
well-considered suggestion of topics on 
which discussion was invited, his tjuick 
decision when all had been heard, com- 
bined to show a thoroughness of mental 
training as rare as his natural ability and 
his facile adaptation to a new and enlarged 
field of labor. 

With perfed; comprehension of all the 
inheritances of the war, with a cool calcu- 
lation of the obstacles in his way, impelled 
always by a generous enthusiasm, Car- 
field conceived that much might be done 



46 

by his Administration towards restoring 
harmony between the different sections of 
the Union. He was anxious to go South 
and speak to the people. As early as 
April he had ineffectually endeavored to 
arrange for a trip to Nashville, whither he 
had been cordially invited, and he was 
again disappointed a few weeks later to 
find that he could not go to South Caro- 
lina to attend the centennial celebration of 
the victory of the Cowpens. But for the 
autumn he definitely counted on being 
present at three memorable assemblies in 
the South; the celebration at \'orkto\\n, 
the opening of the Cotton H.xposition at 
Atlanta, and the meeting of the Army of 
the Cumberland at Chattanooga. He was 
already turning over in his mind his ad- 
dress for each occasion, and the three taken 
together, he said to a friend, gave him the 
exaCt scope and verge which he needed. 
y\t ^'orktown he would liaxe before him 



47 
the associations of a hundred years that 
bound the South and the North in the 
sacred memory of a common danger and a 
common viclory. At Atlanta he would ])rc- 
sent the material interests and the industrial 
development which appealed to the thrift 
and independence of every household, and 
which should unite the two sections by the 
instinct of self-interest and self-defense. At 
Chattanooga he would revive memories of 
the war only to show that after all its dis- 
aster and all its suffering, the country was 
stronger and greater, the Union rendered 
indissoluble, and the future, through the 
atronv and blood of one generation, made 
brighter and better for all. 

CjAKFIi:i.d'.s ambition ior the success of 
his Administration was high. With strong 
caution and conservatism in his nature, he 
was in no danger of attempting rash ex- 
periments or of resorting to the empiricism 
of statesmanship. But he believed that 



48 

renewed and closer attention should be 
given to questions affeciting the material 
interests and commercial prospects of fifty 
millions of people. He believed that 
our continental relations, extensive and 
undeveloped as they are, involved re- 
sponsibility, and could be cultivated into 
profitable friendship or be abandoned to 
harmful indifference or lasting enmity. 
He believed with equal confidence that an 
essential forerunner to a new era of national 
progress must be a feeling of contentment 
in every se{!;l;ion of the Union, and a gen- 
erous belief that the benefits and burdens 
of government would be common to all. 
Himself a conspicuous illustration of what 
ability and ambition may do under repub- 
lican institutions, he loved his country with 
a passion of patriotic devotion, and every 
waking thought was given to her advance- 
ment. He was an American in all his 
aspirations, and he looked to the destiny 



49 
and influence of the United States with the 
philosophic composure of Jefferson and the 
demonstrative confidence of John Adams. 
The poHtical events which disturbed the 
President's serenity for many weeks before 
that fateful day in July form an important 
chapter in his career, and, in his own judg- 
ment, involved questions of principle and 
of right which are vitally essential to the 
constitutional administration of the Fed- 
eral Government. It would be out of 
place here and now to speak the language 
of controversy; but the events referred to, 
however they may continue to be source 
of contention with others, have become, so 
far as Garfield is concerned, as much a 
matter of history as his heroism at Chicka- 
mauga or his illustrious service in the 
House. Detail is not needful, and per- 
sonal antagonism shall not be rekindled 
by any word uttered to-day. The motives 
of those opposing him are not to be here 



50 

adversely interpreted nor their eourse 
harshly characterized. But of the dead 
President this is to be said, and said be- 
cause his own speech is forever silenced 
and he can be no more heard except 
through the fidelity and love of surviving 
friends: from the beginning to the end of 
the controversy he so much deplored, the 
President was never for one moment actu- 
ated by any motive of gain to himself or 
of loss to others. Least of all men did he 
harbor revenge, rarely did he even show 
resentment, and malice was not in his na- 
ture. He w^as congenially employed only 
in the exchange of good offices and the 
doing of kindly deeds. 

There was not an hour, from the begin- 
ning of the trouble till the fatal shot entered 
his body, when the President would not 
gladly, for the sake of restoring harmony, 
have retraced any step he had taken if 
such retracing had merely involved conse- 



51 
qucnccs personal to himself. The pride 
of consistency, or any supposed sense of 
humiliation that mij;ht result from surren- 
dering his jiosition, had not a feather's 
weight w ith him. No man was ever less 
subject to such influences from within or 
from without. lUit alter moht anxious 
deliberation and the coolest survey of all 
the circumstances, he solemnl\' believed 
that the true prerogatives of the Executive 
were involved in the issue which had been 
raised, and that he would be unfaithful to 
his supreme obligation if he failed to 
maintain, in all their vigor, the constitu- 
tional ri'-hts and dignities of his great 
office. He believed this in all the con- 
victions of conscience when in sound and 
vigorous health, and he believed it in his 
suffering and prostration in the last con- 
scious thoui^ht which his wearied mind 
bestowed on the transitor\- struggles of 
life. 



52 

More than this need not be said. Less 
than this could not be said. Justice to the 
dead, the highest obligation that devolves 
upon the living, demands the declaration 
that in all the bearings of the subjed, 
adlual or possible, the President was con- 
tent in his mind, justified in his conscience, 
immovable in his conclusions. 

The religious element in Garfield's 
character was deep and earnest. In his 
early youth he espoused the f^iith of the 
Disciples, a sed of that great Baptist Com- 
munion, which in different ecclesiastical 
establishments is so numerous and so in- 
fluential throughout all parts of the United 
States. But the broadening tendency of 
his mind and his adive spirit of inquiry 
were early apparent, and carried him be- 
yond the dogmas of sect and the restraints 
of association. In selecting a college in 
which to continue his education he rejeded 
Bethany, though presided over by Alex- 



53 

andcr Campbell, the greatest preacher of 
his church. His reasons were characteris- 
tic: first, that Bethany leaned too hea\ily 
towards slavery; and, second, that being 
himself a Disciple and the son of Disciple 
parents, he had little acquaintance with 
people of other beliefs, and he thought it 
would make him more liberal, cjuoting his 
own words, both in his religious and gen- 
,eral views, to go into a new circle and be 
under new influences. 

The liberal tendency which he anticipated 
as the result of wider culture was fully 
realized. He was emancipated from mere 
sedarian belief, and with eager interest 
l)ushed his investigations in the diredion 
of modern jjrogressive thought. He fol- 
lowed with ciuickening step in the. paths 
of exploration and speculation so fearlessly 
trodden by Darwin, by Huxley, by Tyndall, 
and by other living scientists of the radical 
and advanced type. His own church, bind- 



54 
ini;- its disciples by no formulated creed, but 
acceptin;< the Old and New Testaments as 
the word of God, with unbiased liberality of 
private interpretation, favored, if it did not 
stimulate, the spirit of investigation. Its 
members profess with sincerity, and profess 
only, to be of one mind and one faith with 
those who immediately followed the Mas- 
ter, and who were first called Christians at 
Antioch. 

But however high Garmeld reasoned 
of "fixed fate, free will, foreknowledge ab- 
solute," he was never separated from the 
Church of the Disciples in his affedions and 
in his associations. For him it held the Ark 
of the Covenant. To hini it was the gate of 
Heaven. The world of religious belief is 
full of solecisms and contradic'tions. A 
l)hilosophic observer declares that men by 
the thousaml will die in defense of a creed 
whose doctrines they do not comprehend 
and whose tenets they habitually violate. 



55 
It is c([ually true that men by the thousand 
w ill cling to church organizations with in- 
stinctive and undying fidelity when their 
belief in maturer years is radically different 
from that which inspired them as neophytes. 
But after this range of speculation, and 
this latitude of doubt, Gari ii:i.i) came back 
always with freshness and tlelight to the 
simpler instincts of religious faith, which, 
earliest implanted, longest suryiye. Not 
many weeks before his assassination, w alk- 
ing on the banks of the Potomac with a 
friend, and conversing on those topics of 
personal religion, concerning which noble 
natures have an unconquerable reser\'c, he 
said that he found the Lord's Prayer and 
the simple petitions learned in infancy in- 
finitely restful to him, not merely in their 
stated repetition, but in their casual and 
frequent recall as he w ent about the daily 
duties of life. Certain texts of scripture 
had a very strong hold on his memory 



56 

and his heart. lie heard, while in Edin- 
burgh some years ago, an eminent Scotch 
preacher who prefaced his sermon with 
reading the eighth chapter of the Epistle 
to the Romans, which book had been the 
subject of careful study with Garfield 
during all his religious life. He was 
greatly impressed by the elocution of the 
preacher and declared that it had imparted 
a new and deeper meaning to the majestic 
utterance of St. Paul. He referred often 
in after years to that memorable service, 
and dwelt with exaltation of feeling upon 
the radiant promise and the assured hope 
with which the great Apostle of the Gen- 
tiles was "persu^ided that neither death, 
nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor 
powers, nor things present, nor things to 
come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other 
creature, shall be able to separate us from 
the U)ve of God, which is in Christ Jesus 
our Lord." 



57 

The crowniniT characteristic of General 
Garfield's religious opinions, as, indeed, 
of all his opinions, was his liberality. In 
all things he had charity. Tolerance was 
of his nature. He respeded in others 
the c[ualities which he possessed himself— 
sincerity of conviction and frankness of 
expression. With him the inquiry was 
not so much what a man believes, but 
does he believe it? The lines of his 
friendship and his confidence encircled 
men of every creed, and men of no creed, 
and to the end of his life, on his ever- 
lemrthenino- list of friends, were to be 
found the names of a pious Catholic priest 
and of an honest-minded and generous- 
hearted free-thinker. 

On the morning of Saturday, July sec- 
ond, the President was a contented and 
happy man — not in an ordinary degree, 
but joyfully, almost boyishly happy. On 
his way to the railroad station, to which he 



58 

drove slowiy, in conscious enjc^iyment of 
the beautiful morning, with an unwonted 
sense of leisure and a keen anticipation of 
pleasure, his talk was all in the grateful 
and gratulatory vein. He felt that after 
four months of trial his Administration 
was strong in its grasp of affairs, strong 
in popular favor, and destined to grow 
stronger; that grave difficulties confront- 
ino' him at his inauguration had been 
safely passed; that trouble lay behind hini 
and not before him; that he was soon to 
meet the wife whom he lo\ed, now recov- 
ering from an illness \\hich had but lately 
disquieted and at times almost unnerved 
him; that he was Qoing to his Alma Mater 
to renew the most cherished associations 
of his young manhood, and to exchange 
greetings with those whose deepening 
interest had followed every step of his 
upward progress from the day he entered 
upon his college course until he had at- 



59 
tained the loftiest elevation in the ;<ift of 
his countrymen. 

Surely, if happiness can ever come from 
the honors or triumphs of this world, on 
that quiet July morning Jami:s A. (i.\K- 
FiiiLi) may well ha\e been a happy man. 
No foreboding of evil haunted him; no 
slightest premonition of danger clouded 
his skv. His terrible fate was upon him in 
an instant. One moment he stood ereci, 
strong, confident in the years stretching 
peacefully out before him. The next he 
lay wounded, bleeding, helpless, doomed 
to weary weeks of torture, to silence, and 
the grave. 

Great in life, he was surpassingly great 
in death. For no cause, in the very frenzy 
of wantonness and wickedness, by the red 
hand of murder, he was thrust from the full 
tide of this world's interest, from its hopes, 
its aspirations, its vittories, into the visible 
presence of death — and he did not (piail. 



6o 

Not alone for the one short moment in 
which, stunned and dazed, he could give 
up life, hardly aware of its relinquishment, 
but through days of deadly languor, 
tlu-ough weeks of agony, that was not less 
agony because silently borne, with clear 
sight and calm courage, he looked into 
his open grave. What blight and ruin met 
his anguished eyes, whose lips may tell — 
what brilliant, Ijroken plans, what baffled, 
high ambitions, what sundering of strong, 
warm, manhood's friendships, what bitter 
rending of sweet household ties! Behind 
him a proud, expedant nation, a great host 
of sustaining friends, a cherished and happy 
mother, wearing the full, rich honors other 
early toil and tears ; the wife of his youth, 
whose whole life lay in his; the little boys 
not yet emerged from childhood's day of 
frolic; the fair young daughter; the sturdy 
sons just springing into closest companion- 
ship, claiming every day and every day 



■\ 



6i 

rewarding a father's love and care; and in 
his heart the eager, rejoicing power to meet 
all demand. Before him, desolation and 
great darkness! And his soul was not 
shaken. His countr>'men were thrilled with 
instant, profound, and universal sympathy. 
Masterful in his mortal weakness, he lie- 
came the center of a nation's love, enshrined 
in the prayers of a world. But all the love 
and all the sympathy could not share with 
him his suffering. He trod the wine-press 
alone. W'idi unfaltering front he faced 
death. With unfailing tenderness he took 
leave of life. Above the demoniac hiss of 
the assassin's bullet he heard the \oice of 
Gotl. With simple resignation he bowed 
to the divine decree. 

As the end drew near, his early craving 
for the sea returned. The stately mansion 
of power had been to him the wearisome 
hospital of pain, and he begged to be taken 
from its prison walls, from its oppressive. 



62 

stiflinu air, from its homelessness and its 
hopelessness. Gently, silently, the love of 
a ^reat people bore the pale sufferer to the 
longed-for healing of the sea, to live or to 
die, as God should will, within sight of its 
heaving billows, within sound of its mani- 
fold voices. With wan, fevered face ten- 
derly lifted to the cooling breeze, he looked 
out wistfully upon the ocean's changing 
wonders ; on its far sails, whitening in the 
morning light; on its restless waves, rolling 
shoreward to break and die beneath the 
noonday sun; on the red clouds of even- 
ing, arching low to the horizon ; on the 
serene and shining pathway of the stars. 
Let us think that his dying eyes read a 
mystic meaning which only the rapt and 
parting soul may know. Let us believe 
that in the silence of the receding world he 
heard the great waves breaking on a farther 
shore, and felt already upon his wasted 
brow the breath of the eternal niornin*'. 



A p p p: X P) I X . 

The Senate on December 6th adopted 
the following resolution : 

Resolved, That a committee of six Sen- 
ators i)e appointed, on the jxirt of the 
Senate, to join such committee as may 
be appointed, on the part of the Plouse, 
to consider and report 1)\- what token of 
respecl and affeclion it may be proper for 
the Congress of the P^nited States to ex- 
press the deep sensibilit\- of the Nation to 
the event of the decease of the late Presi- 
dent, Iamhs a. CjARFIHLI), and that so 
much of the message of the President as 
relates to that melancholy event be referred 
to said committee. 

The Committee on the part of the Sen- 
ate. ha\ ing been subsecjuently increased to 

63 



66 

E. Hooker of Mississippi, Nicolas Ford 
of Missouri, Edward K. Valentine of 
Nebraska, George W. Cassidy of Nevada, 
Joshua G. Hall of New Hampshire, John 
Hill of New Jersey, Samuel S. Cox of 
New York, Robert B. Vance of North 
Carolina, Melvin C. George of Oregon, 
Charles O'Neill of Pennsylvania, Jonathan 
Chace of Rhode Island, D. Wyatt Aiken 
of South Carolina, Augustus H. Pettibone 
of Tennessee, Roger Q. Mills of Texas, 
Charles H. Joyce of Vermont, J. Randolph 
Tucker of Virginia, Benjamin Wilson of 
West Virginia, and Charles G. Williams 
of Wisconsin, were appointed as the com- 
mittee on the part of the House. 

The following concurrent resolutions 
were adopted by both Houses of Con- 
gress December 21, 1881 : 

Whereas the melancholy event of the 
violent and tragic death of Jamus Abram 



67 

Garfikld, late President of the United 
States, having occurred during the recess 
of Congress, and the two Houses sharing 
in the general grief and desiring to mani- 
fest their sensibility upon the occasion of 
the public bereavement: Therefore, 

Be it resolved by the Senate and House 
of Representatives, That the two Houses 
of Congress will assemble in the Hall of 
the House of Representatives on a day 
and hour to be fixed and announced by 
the Joint Committee, and that in the pres- 
ence of the two Houses there assembled 
an address upon the life and character 
of Jami:s Ahram Garfii:li), late Presi- 
dent of the United States, be pronounced 
by Hon. James (i. Blaine, and that the 
President of the Senate pro tempore and 
the Speaker of the House of Representa- 
tives be requested to in\ite the President 
and ex-Presidents of the United States, 
the Heads of the several Departments, the 



68 

Judges of the Supreme Court, the repre- 
sentatives of the foreign Governments near 
this Government, the Governors of the sev- 
eral States, the General of the Army and 
the Admiral of the Navy, and such officers 
of the Army and Navy as have received 
the thanks of Congress, who may then be 
at the seat of Government, to be present 
on the occasion. 

And be it fitrthcy resolved, That the 
President of the United States be requested 
to transmit a copy of these resolutions to 
Mrs. Lucretia R. Garfield, and to assure 
her of the profound sympathy of the two 
Houses of Congress for her deep personal 
afflidion, and of their sincere condolence 
for the late national bereavement. 

And the following by both Houses on 
February i, 1882: 

Resolved by the Senate and House of 
Representatives, That Monday, the 27th 



69 

day of February, 1882, be set apart for the 
Memorial Services upon the late President, 
James Aiskam Garfielu. 

A programme of arrangements was pre- 
pared by the Joint Committee, as follows: 

The Capitol will be closed on the morn- 
ing of the 27th to all except the members 
and officers of Congress. 

At ten o'clock the east door leading to 
the Rotunda will be opened to those to 
whom invitations have been extended 
under the joint resolution of Congress by 
the Presiding Officers of the two Houses, 
and to those holding tickets of admission 
to the galleries. 

The Hall of the House of Representa- 
tives will be opened for the admission of 
Representatives, and to those who have 
invitations, who will be conducted to the 
seats assigned to them, as follows: 



70 

The President and ex-Presidents of the 
United States and special guests will be 
seated in front of the Speaker. 

The Chief Justice and Associate Justices 
of the Supreme Court will occupy seats 
next to the President and ex-Presidents 
and special guests, on the right of the 
Speaker. 

The Cabinet officers, the General of the 
Army and Admiral of the Navy, and the 
officers of the Army and Navy who, by 
name, have received the thanks of Con- 
gress, will occupy seats on the left of the 
Speaker. 

The Chief Justice and Judges of the 
Court of Claims and the Chief Justice and 
Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of 
the Distrid; of Columbia will occupy seats 
dire(^tly in the rear of the Supreme Court. 

The Diplomatic Corps will occupy the 
front row of seats. 

Ex-Vice-Presidents, Senators, and ex- 



71 
Senators will occupy seats on the second, 
third, fourth, and fifth rows, on east side of 
main aisle. 

Representatives will occupy seats on 
west side of main aisle and in rear -of the 
Senators on cast side. 

Commissioners of the Distrid, Govern- 
ors of States and Territories, Assistant 
Heads of Departments, and invited guests 
will occupy seats in rear of Representa- 
tives. 

The Executive Gallery will be reserved 
exclusively for the families of the Supreme 
Court and the families of the Cabinet and 
the invited guests of the President. Tickets 
thereto will be delivered to the Private 
Secretary of the President. 

The Diplomatic Gallery will be reserved 

exclusively for the families of the members 

of the Diplomatic Corps. Tickets thereto 

will be delivered to the Secretary of State. 

The Reporters' Gallery will be reserved 



72 

exclusively for the use of the reporters for 
the Press. Tickets thereto will be delivered 
to the Press Committee. 

The Official Reporters of the Senate and 
of the House will occupy the Reporters 
desk in front of the Clerk's table. 

The House of Representatives will be 
called to order by the Speaker at twelve 
o'clock. 

The Marine Band will be in attendance. 

The Senate will assemble at twelve 
o'clock, and immediately after prayer will 
proceed to the Hall of the House of 
Representatives. 

The Diplomatic Corps will meet at half 
past eleven o'clock in Representatives' 
Lobby, and be conducted by the Sergeant- 
at-Arms of the House to the seats assigned 
to them. 

The President of the Senate will occupy 
the Speaker's chair. 

The Speaker of the House will occupy 



73 
a scat at the left of the President of the 
Senate. 

The Chaplains of the Senate and of the 
House will occupy seats next to the Pre- 
sidini,^ Officers of their respcdive Houses. 

The Chairmen of the Joint Committee 
of Arrangements will occupy seats at the 
riuht and left of the Orator, and next to 
them will be seated the Secretary of the 
Senate and the Clerk of the House. 

The other officers of the Senate and of 
the House will occupy seats on the floor 
at the right and the left of the Speaker's 
Platform. 

Prayer will be offered by the Rev. F. D. 
Power, Chaplain of the House of Repre- 
sentatives. 

The Presiding Officer will then present 
the Orator of the Day. 

The benediction will l)e pronounced by 
the Rev. J. J. Bullock, Chaplain of the 
Senate. 



74 

By reason of the limited capacity of the 
galleries the number of tickets is neces- 
sarily restrid;ed, and will be distributed as 
follows : 

To each Senator, Representative, and 
Delegate, three tickets. 

No person will be admitted to the 
Capitol except on presentation of a ticket, 
which will be good only for the place 
indicated. 

The Archited; of the Capitol and the 

Sergeant-at-Arms of the Senate and Ser- 

geant-at-Arnis of the House are charged 

with the execution of these arrangements. 

John Sherman, 

Wm. McKinley, Jr., 

C/iainiicii yoiiit Coiiunittee. 



Proceedings in the Hall of Rcpfcscntativcs, 
Monday, Febniary 2j, 1882. 

The House met ut twelve o'clock m. 
Prayer by the Chaplain, Rev. I\ I). Power. 

The Speaker. This day has been dedi- 
cated by the action of the two Houses 
of Congress to services in commemora- 
tion of the life and death of Ja.mi:s Abram 
Garfield, late President of the United 
States. This action was taken through 
the adoption of concurrent resolutions by 
the unanimous vote of the two Houses, 
presented by a Selecl Joint Committee ap- 
pointed "to consider and report by what 
token of respedl, esteem, and affection it 
may be proper for Congress to express its 
and the nation's deep sensibility over the 
event of the decease of our late President." 

75 



76 

This House is now assembled and ready 
to perform its part in the solemn duty. 
The Clerk will read the concurrent resolu- 
tions. 

The Clerk read the concurrent resolu- 
tions of December 21 and February i. 

The Senate met at twelve- o'clock m.; 
and, after the following prayer by the 
Chaplain, Rev. J. J. Bullock, proceeded to 
the Hall of Representatives : 

Almighty God, our Heavenly Father, 
we desire to look up to Thee for Thy 
blessing to rest upon the services of this 
day. Sandify to us the Memorial Serv- 
ices upon which we are about to attend. 
Deeply impress upon our minds a sense 
of our mortality and the importance of 
being ever ready for our departure, for we 
know not the day nor the hour when we 
may be called hence. 

Bless, we pray Thee, our rulers, the 



77 
President of the United States, the Presi- 
dent of the Senate, the Senators and Rep- 
resentatives in Congress, and all others in 
authority. Give them grace and wisdom 
for the right discharge of their important 
duties. 

God, be merciful unto us and bless us. 
Cause His face to shine upon us, and give 
us peace in our day and generation, and 
finally save us all in Heaven. We ask for 
Christ our Redeemer's sake. Amen. 

The President pyo tcmpovc of the 
Senate called the two Houses to order. 

Rev. F. D. Power, Chaplain of the 
House of Representatives, offered prayer, 
as follows : 

O Lord, our God, we thank Thee for this 
hour and for this service. We thank Thee 
for a great life given to this Nation; for 
its genius and potencies; for its example 



78 

and memories; for its immortality and 
eternity. May this Republic never forget 
its dead. 

As we come together this day to recall 
the wisdom, the integrity, the statesman- 
ship, the loyalty, the reverence for Thee 
and Thy word, the unselfish love for 
country and for all mankind, wherewith 
Thou didst endow Thy servant and fit 
him for the administration of the affairs 
of the Government; as we meditate upon 
the patience, the sweetness, the fortitude, 
the faith, the quiet resignation to Thy 
will wherewith Thou didst fit him for his 
sore trial ; as we remember his triumph 
and our sorrow, grant us Thy gracious 
benedi(5tion. 

We bear, during this Memorial Service, 
our Father, before Thee, on our hearts, his 
loved ones with whcMii we weep. Sustain, 
\vc beseech Thee, the mother who bore 
him. May the peace of God that passeth 



79 

all understanding be the strength and the 
crown of her spirit. Be ver\ merciful to 
the \\ ife in her present separation from the 
husband of her youth. May she rest in 
God, and may she find such sympathy and 
joy in her Saviour as the world cannot give 
nor take away. He a father to the children 
now fatherless, and nia\ they imitate the 
virtues of their illustrious parent, and like 
him be useful in li\ing and mourned in 
dying. May the youth of this land and 
of all lands feel the power of his example 
and follow in his footsteps. May those 
who rule among us and among men every- 
where by the study of his virtues be incited 
to like patriotism and piet)-. 

Now we ask Thy blessing on this assem- 
bly. May the remembrance of this great 
life be a genuine help to all those present 
and that greater audience waiting w ithout. 
Give grace and utterance to Thy servant 
who shall speak to us. May his words 



8o 

be wise and worthy and fitly chosen, like 
apples of gold in picl;ures of silver. 

Remember Thy servant before Thee, the 
President of the United States. Preserve 
him from evil influences and evil men. 
May truth rest upon his brow, wisdom 
upon his lips, justice in his hands, and 
grace in his heart. Bless his counselors, 
this Congress assembled, our magistrates 
and judges, our Army and Navy, our 
schools and churches, our whole land and 
all the inhabitants thereof 

May we keep alive in us the faith and 
virtue of those who have passed before. 
Give peace in our time. Make religion 
and righteousness, truth and justice, knowl- 
edge and freedom to abound everywhere. 
May Thy name be glorified and Thy king- 
dom rule over us from sea to sea. 

We ask it all reverently, through Jesus 
Christ, our Lord. Amen.. 



8i 

The President /w tempore of the Sen- 
ate said: Senators and Representatives, 
this day is dedicated by Congress for me- 
morial services upon the late President, 
James A. Gariteld. I present to you 
Hon. James G. Blaine, who has been fitly 
chosen as the Orator for this historical 
occasion. 

The Memorial Address was then deliv- 
ered by Mr. Blaine. 

Upon its conclusion. Rev. J. J. Bullock, 
Chaplain of the Senate, pronounced the 
benediction, as follows : 

May the peace of God. which passeth all 
understanding, keep your minds and hearts 
in the knowledge and love of God and His 
Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. And the bless- 
ing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, 
and the Holy Ghost, rest upon and remain 
with you, now and forevermore. Amen. 



OI 1- 



82 

The President and his Cabinet, the Chief 
Justice and Associate Justices of the Su- 
preme Court, and other invited guests then 
retired from the Hall; after which the Sen- 
ate returned to their Chamber. 

The House having been called to order, 
Mr. McKiNLEY submitted the tollow- 
ing resolutions; which were unanimously 
adopted by the House, and, on the suc- 
ceeding day, by the Senate: 

Rcso/vcif by the Senate and House of 
Representatives, That the thanks of Con- 
gress be presented to Hon. James C. 
Blaine, for the appropriate Memorial Ad- 
dress delivered by him on the life and 
services of J.\AiKS AbryVM Gari-ield, late 
President of the United States, in the 
Representatives' Hall, before both Houses 
of C'ongress and their invited guests, on 
the 27th day of February, 1882; and that 



83 
he be requested to furnish a copy for 
publication. 

Resolved, That the Chairmen of the Joint 
Committee appointed to make the neces- 
sary arrangements to carr>' into effccl the 
resolutions of this Congress in relation to 
the memorial exercises in honor of Jamks 
Abram Garfield be requested to commu- 
nicate to Mr. Blaine the foregoing resolu- 
tion, receive his answer thereto, and present 
the same to both Houses of Congress. 

Mr. McKiNLEY. I now offer the resolu- 
tion which I send to the Clerk's desk. 

The Clerk read as follows: 

Resolved, That, as a further testimonial 
of resped to the deceased President of the 
United States, the House do now adjourn. 

The resolution was adopted ; and there- 
upon (at one o'clock and fifty-five minutes 
p. m.) the House adjourned. 



Correspondence. 

The CAriTOL, 
Washington, D. C, 
Fcbrnary 28, 1882. 

Sir: Wc have the honor to present to 
you an official copy of two concurrent res- 
olutions, unanimously passed by the Sen- 
ate and House of Representatives of the 
United States on the 27th instant, express- 
ing the thanks of Congress for the appro- 
priate Memorial Address pronounced by 
you upon the Life and Services of James 
Abram Garfield, late President of the 
United States, and dircding us to recjuest 
from you a copy of the Address for publi- 
cation. 

In performing this agreeable duty, we 



86 

avail ourselves of the opportunity to ex- 
press our hearty satisfaction with your 
very able Address, and beg that you will 
be pleased to furnish a copy of it for pub- 
lication. 

We have the honor to be, with great 
respedt, your obedient servants, 
John Sherman, 
Cliairiuau on the part of the Senate. 

Wm. McKinlev, Jr., 
Chairman on the part of the House. 

To the Honorable 

James G. Blaine. 



Washington, D. C, 

March 2, 1S82. 

Gentlemen: With profound apprecia- 
tion of the honor conferred upon me by 
the Resolution of Congress, which you 



87 
transmit, and with my sincere thanks for 
your own kindly expressions, I take pleas- 
ure in sending herewith a'cojjy of the 
Memorial Address for publication. 

Very respedfully and sincerely, 

James G. Blaine. 
Hon. John Sher.max, 

Chainnaii on the part of the Senate. 
Hon. Wm. IVIcKinlev, Jr.. 

Chairman on the part of the House. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

inriii!iii UP 



lilt nil' III lllllllllMl 

013 789 886 A 



i^yf^^^/ jf^yyy 



^- 



